What Ticketmaster Doesn't Want You To Know: Concerts Were Cheap For Decades
What Ticketmaster Doesn't Want You To Know: Concerts Were Cheap For Decades
I have a ticket stub in my basement from when I saw Nine Inch Nails and A Perfect Circle for $40, so I definitely remember. I went to a ton of concert when I was younger making a fraction of what I make now.
That concert was in 2000, so in today's money that $40 would be around $72.
In 2022 I saw NIN in Cleveland and got GA tickets for $48 each (including fees).
Keep in mind NIN in 2022 doesn't have the leading act draw they had in 2000, and that isn't the same as say 1990.
We need metrics that include their popularity/ticket sales, etc.
I paid $100 a ticket in 1985 for a stadium sellout band at the time. Ten years before my older siblings paid $40 for the same band.
I mean, there's a drastic difference in cultural relevance over those 20 years. 2000 was at the tail end of their peak. Supply/demand would certainly affect the equation.
I don't have the ability to listen to a video right now to engage with the points this video specifically makes, but I will share something I just recently learnt that may alleviate some of the blame from Ticketmaster for concerts becoming expensive.
There's been a complete flip in the music industry. It used to be that record sales were the primary means of musicians getting income, and they would use concert tours as an advertisement for their records. But since digital downloads of singles, and even more since streaming, people listening to their music at home doesn't make much money for musicians anymore, except for from the small subset of hardcore fans who might be buying vinyl or other collectors' items. So instead they make money by touring and selling merch (which itself is often associated with a tour). Which naturally means prices need to rise.
None of this absolves Ticketmaster for its role in dishonestly raising the prices through the use of extra mandatory fees. The advertised price should be the minimum price you can actually pay, inclusive of all required components.
Didn't most musicians earn their biggest part with merch & concerts back in the day though?
Touring and merch have always been the only way artists could make money. The albums and videos are the advertisement.
Unless you’re at the top, touring and merch have always been the money-makers. Can you provide evidence of this flip? Speaking from 20+ yr in DIY music, I’ve never known a band who wasn’t in big box stores to make anything approaching stable money off records and the bands I know in big box stores aren’t big enough to make much at all off 10% to 20% of a low volume of sales. Bands that are big enough to sell out a stadium are above my scope so I can only guess, say, Metallica made enough off record sales to do dumb shit like sue Napster.
On the backend I have yet to see a valid reason other than greed for a ticket servicer or artist to gouge prices as high as they go. Ticketmaster has openly talked about how they happily hide higher prices behind service fees for artists too afraid to openly gouge and secretly colludes with artists.
I don’t have the ability to listen to a video right now
This is the same as reading a clickbait headline and going off in the wrong direction. Your point is contradicted in the summary of the video and skimming the summary highlights all the things you would need to know.
What you're talking about happened way before the Ticketmaster-Live Nation monopoly became a thing. Today if you want to make a medium to large concert you have no choice most of the time but to use a Live Nation venue and Ticketmaster for tickets. For example Live Nation owns all large concert venues in Toronto and I recently learned they've purchased the well known smaller venues over the last few years. They're now in a position to extract more value from fans and performers. Similar to how large grocery chains can extract from both customers and suppliers.
You should see the video though. It explains things well.
This is the most absurd falsehood I’ve ever read in my life.
Support your local music scene! I mean like bars, cafes, clubs, outdoors, even restaurants can have local or regional groups playing in all kinds of styles and they're often pretty good. You can be feet away from the band and talk to them afterwards if you want, and the cost is minimal.
Oh you think I forgot what it was like in my teens. I just don’t go to shows anymore.
There's is a simple solution to this: stop buying concert tickets. I know, I know - who wouldn't want to get together with thousands of other people in a tiny space and listen to the same music together, feel the same beats, breathe the same air, share the same pathogens... Sounds great.
But this is how price exploration works (which in a monopoly looks a lot like price gouging). You have a product and want to make more money, so you double (often less, this is a simplification) your prices thinking if it's too much people will stop buying and you'll have a sale or drop prices back to what they were. But people keep buying your product, so of course you're going to keep the price the same even if you get a couple of dirty looks. So after a bit you reason if people are willing to pay 2x for it, maybe they'll pay 2.5x or 3x, so you try it, and it works... Rinse and repeat.
The only way to break the cycle is legislation (not likely, but more consumer protections would of course be welcome) or to stop buying.
these kind of boycotts have never really worked to impact lasting change.
They don't work because concert tickets are still under valued. If an artist can sell out a 9,000 person venue at $20 a seat, and then they find out they can still sell out the same venue charging $200 a seat - just to a different crowd, then they are going to go with the $200 option.
I love going to concerts and now that I'm older I mostly avoid General Admission tickets, so I'm already paying more. This year I've gone to 6 concerts and on average I've paid around $120 per ticket. While expensive, I've never felt like what I paid wasn't worth it. But, when it comes to beer/water/food I always feel that it's over priced and not worth the cost. Don't get me started on the employee asking for a 20% tip on a $20 beer.
It's not a boycott. Boycotts don't work because they appeal to and are based in emotion. I'm appealing to your wallet. If you can't afford concert tickets, don't buy them. Don't go without something you need to make it work, don't use credit. Just don't buy, like you don't buy a new car every few years or how you don't buy a gold-plated snickerdoodle or whatever.
Otherwise, the company is right and people will pay a lot more for the product, so they'd think themselves crazy not to raise the price.
Concerts used to be loss leaders to drive album sales
With albums sales down the concert has become the product and ticket master's business model is to be the only game in town and wring out as much money from concert goers as possible
There really needs to be an anti-trust lawsuit against ticketmaster
I think a part of the reason concerts are so expensive is big acts tour with an army of performers and stage hands to ensure the music sounds exactly like the recording. That's what the audience has come to expect.
